Camping and Other Brilliant Ideas
by Slightly Improbable
Summary: Doctor Who was arguable one of the biggest shows in Britain. Many fans would do anything for the show to be real and become a part of it. Catherine Harris was not that fan. In fact, she's never even watched the show. OC fic
1. Chapter 1

It wasn't a dark and stormy night. Nor was it a gloriously sunny day. It was, however, dull, depressingly overcast, and the clouds themselves looked as if they would burst into tears any moment. Unfortunately for one, it was also the Harris family's idea of "perfect camping weather".

If you asked Catherine Harris what she thought of camping, she could give you one of two answers. The first being an entirely appropriate, PG answer on how fantastic it is that she can spend time with her family. Alternatively, she could give a response usually reserved for mature audiences, complete with (in her opinion) a rather accurate description of the resemblance between her sister's face and rear end.

Catherine sighed audibly in the hopes that the younger Harris sister, Fiona, would take the hint and stop talking. But no one ever said Fiona was smart. And no one ever said Catherine was listening.

"You get what I'm saying, right?" Fiona asked, turning fully to face Catherine. Her eyes were unblinking and completely focused on what Catherine's answer would be.

Meanwhile, Catherine's brain went into a state of sheer, bloody panic. Yes, no, maybe, of cour- "Umm, what?"

Might as well just slap 'Failure at Life' on my forehead now, thought Catherine. Hmmm, I could use Fiona's new lipstick, it is bright enough. She tilted her head to inspect the colour and noticed that the lips were actually moving again. Not surprising, really.

Fiona sighed deeply and dramatically before continuing, "What I'm saying is, Cathy dearest, is that I have no signal." She made sure to drag out every word she said as if she were explaining it to a child. If anything, it should be me dumbing it down for her, Cathy grumbled in her head.

"What's the problem with having no signal? We're camping," or attempting to, Cathy added mentally, "I thought that meant 'spending time together and bonding as a family'." Cathy did what she thought was a rather accurate imitation of their mother at this point, complete with and upturned nose and a posh, nasally voice.

Fiona huffed in an indignant manner but couldn't suppress a slight smirk at her sister's impression. "If I have no signal, then I cant text or call my boyfriend." Her face looked quite distraught at the mere notion.

Cathy snorted but quickly covered it up as a cough and looked down sheepishly. Well, might as well play along… What was her boyfriend's name again? "How is Paul, by the way?" She asked, attempting to fake an interest.

"Peter"

"What?"

"His name is Peter," Fiona flipped a few golden brown curls over her shoulder before continuing, snootily, "Paul was last week."

"Paul was yesterday." Cathy deadpanned.

"Oh, well, sticks and stones." Fiona retorted and once again turned to Cathy, "But let's talk about the real issue here," she paused for what she thought to be dramatic effect, "when was the last time that you got laid?"

Cathy didn't reply and seemed to be content with doing her impression of a flabbergasted goldfish.

Fiona simply took this as an invitation to continue, "I mean, really got laid! You're 26 and when was the last time you had a boyfriend? Or even a one night stand!" She used her arms to exaggerate what she was saying and stared at her sister as if she were diseased and highly contagious.

Cathy decided to drop the goldfish act, but could only sputter wildly as she tried to form a coherent sentence. She eventually shut her mouth completely and turned a rather violent shade of red. Just don't say anything, she thought. If you don't respond, she'll just go away.

No such luck

"I'm just taking this vow of silence as you admitting that I'm right." Fiona sang, triumphantly. She grinned at Cathy like the cat that got the cream for a few moments, before going back to her frantic phone waving.

Right. Bugger this, Cathy decided. She stood awkwardly, trying not to smack her head off the tent and did a strange standing crawl towards the exit/entrance. Pushing her head outside, she squinted at the sky slightly, deciding that not even the promise of rain was going to keep her in that tent any longer than need be.

"You're not going to find a man out there," Fiona laughed, "unless you're into Bigfoot!" She seemed quite proud of her joke and went back to her phone, presumably to try tweeting it.

It took every ounce of Cathy's strength to resist the childish urge of turning around an sticking her tongue out. She instead felt it was more appropriate to shove her middle finger into the giggling 18 year old's face before fighting her way out of the ten's exit/entrance.

* * *

**Author Note**

**Hey! Thanks for reading! This is my first fic so please R&R, it would be much appreciated!**

**- Callie**


	2. Chapter 2

The forest couldn't exactly be called a bog, but it was pretty damn close. Cathy's feet sunk into the squelching mud with every step she took. She tugged hard on her boot each time it got stuck, muttering curses under her breath. Most of which were directed at her sister, and occasionally her mother.

Now that Cathy had finally given it some thought, she hadn't really planned on where she was going. Only that she needed out of that tent before her sister needed a nose job. The first option was, by far, cheaper.

Cathy scowled at the thought of Fiona. Her sister always had to have a finger in all the pies, and her annoyingly perfect nose in everybody else's business. Sure, they had the same thin, straight nose, but Fiona somehow managed to make it look better.

While Fiona had a petite, full figure, Cathy was alarmingly tall and gangly. She supposed she was just one of those people. It was something to do with her metabolism, right? But that didn't mean she didn't hate it, and so did her mother. Dressing your roughly six foot, lanky daughter in dresses and heels was surprising difficult.

It was the hair, as well. Fiona had natural golden brown curls that seemed to fall into a prefect frame for her face. On the other hand, Cathy had annoyingly thick hair that had been responsible for the deaths of more than a few combs. By this point, she'd given up with brushing and mostly just braided it or put up. Her hair was once the same shade of brown, but she'd dyed it so many times in her teenage years that it was stuck in a perpetual dark auburn shade, while her roots still managed to hold onto most of the bright red colour from her previous dying escapade.

And then there were Cathy's freckles. The bloody, effing, freckles.

However, Cathy could relate to her younger sister, somewhat. She remembered being that age and wanting nothing more than to do and see everything imaginable. That was all behind her now though. Cathy was no longer a teenager, she had learnt to grow up. Or at least appear as if she had.

She could always remember when she was a child, thinking that one day something big was going to happen. Something that would change her life forever. As a child she'd dreamt of stars and had fantasies of travelling to the very ends of the universe, but was soon shot down by her family and told that none of it was possible.

The sky still looked bleak, and the air felt damp.

"You better not rain, I swear to God if you do…" Cathy pleaded (Read: threatened) with the sky. She was already pretty far away from the tent. And as dramatic as running through the rain looked, she didn't fancy giving it a go. Drowned rat wasn't really her look.

It also looked much darker than when she'd left. How far had she walked? How long had she been out there? With a quick flick of her wrist, Cathy checked her watch. It was a gift from her mother and probably one of the more expensive items that she owned. The time read roughly eight o'clock.

"Yup, I think now is about time to be heading back," She decided, stretching out a few of the words and popping the P.

Turning around, Cathy soon realised that there really wasn't much of a difference between the direction she was previously facing, and where she was now. Maybe it's just a forest thing, she thought, they just like to try and confuse you.

"Well guess what, forest? I'm not falling for your tricks," Cathy decided. "Also, I need to pee and I'm sure as hell not going in a bush."

That was her decision made, and Cathy once again began to trudge through the mud.

Of course, the sky would choose that moment to finally burst. Cathy did the one and only thing she could think of, and that was blame her sister.

* * *

_8:17pm_

The clock just seemed to laugh at Cathy. As did the trees and everything else in that God dammed forest.

She was lost. Hopelessly so. Not that she was ready to admit it just yet. It would probably take another 15 minutes to get her to do that.

Walking was proving even more difficult with the added rainfall. With every step, Cathy was in danger of losing a boot. Her vocabulary had expanded and become considerably more colourful than before. She didn't care. It's not like anyone was around to see or hear her turning the air fifty shades of blue.

At least the trees managed to provide some cover from the rain, no matter how measly, and Cathy was grateful for that. Her jacket didn't have a hood, and the thick cloth of her hoodie would only become soaked through. Now that she thought about it, that kind of defeated the purpose of a hood. The blue and white striped fabric had already darkened considerably from the added moisture. On the bright side, her jacket was waterproof and pretty warm, so it's not like she would freeze to death out there. Although, she hadn't quite ruled out the possibility of drowning.

* * *

_8:29pm_

"Fan-bloody-tastic…" Cathy seethed through gritted teeth.

At risk of stating the obvious, she was still lost. And as to whether she thought she was any closer to the tent, well, it all depended on whether Cathy was feeling like and optimist or a pessimist that day.

Looking up, Cathy took another good look at her surroundings.

Tree, tree, log, mud, more mud, another bloody tree, blue thing, moss, le-

"Blue?" Cathy questioned aloud, furrowing her brow.

As far as she knew, nothing was naturally blue, meaning what she saw must be man-made. In other words, there were people out there. Whether it was her family or not, she didn't know, nor did she care. She still needed to pee, and people usually meant a bathroom.

That settled it. Cathy knew where she was going now and she immediately set off towards the blue.

* * *

A box.

It was a bloody blue box.

It was a bloody blue police box.

It was a bloody blue police box, in the middle of the woods, and it was smoking.

Maybe there was a policeman inside and he just had a certain inclination towards smoking a pipe, Cathy reasoned rather unconvincingly.

"Unfortunately, beggars can't be choosers," Cathy sighed, "And as much as I hate being the beggar, I don't have a choice."

Edging a little closer, Cathy inspected the sign on the door. _Pull to open_, okay, seems reasonable enough, she thought., maybe I should knock first, just in case…

After knocking roughly four times on the wooden doors, there was no answer.

"Odd… Right then, I'm just taking this all as a 'just make sure to close the door behind you' sort of invite…"

Unfortunately, tugging on the doors as instructed seemed to do bugger all. By this point, Cathy was getting frustrated again. Okay, maybe she should take up those anger management classes like her mother keeps suggesting.

Maybe it's just locked, the calmer, more logical part of Cathy's mind offered. Or maybe the sign's just lying, called the more creative, slightly insane part of her brain.

She still has no idea why she listened to the latter thought. But when she pressed her hand flat against the blue door, something just felt right.

As she put more weight on her hand, she felt the door shift just a tiny bit. Soon enough, Cathy had practically pushed her whole body weight onto the door. It had only nudged a centimetre, if that.

Fine, she thought, one more go and then I'm leaving for good.

Pulling back, Cathy steadied herself before finally throwing all of her weight onto the door. At least, she would have done if the door was still closed. Instead, her face came into contact with a not-so-lovely floor.

"Oh, hello there! What are you doing with your face pressed into the ground? That can't be very comfortable. At least, based on my personally experiences it's not. You might beg to differ though and- Oh! I love your wellies! Green and orange, very cool. Do you mind getting up though? Not very good for first impressions."

Forget the anger management. Cathy would much rather just punch this asshat standing over her.

* * *

**So... Please don't hurt me...?**

**I know I took ages to update this one, and I apologise. I started writing and Avengers fanfic and my mind kind of ran away with me there. It tends to do that when I don't keep it on a tight leash.**

**Sorry, I can't make any promises about faster updates, but I'll try to do it as often as possible.**

**Thanks for reading and reviews encourage me to write faster!**

**- Callie**


	3. Chapter 3

Okay… So, girl knocks on door repeatedly; Doctor being the incredibly cool person that he is, answers said door; girl face-plants on TARDIS floor; Doctor (once again being incredibly cool might he add) compliments girl's wellies and suggests that she should get up.

This isn't making sense, the Doctor thought, reviewing what had just happened. Why isn't she getting up? She's definitely breathing, he decided, so she's alive. He crouched down next to her, his trousers rising well above his ankles as he did so. Yeah, definitely a breather, he thought upon closer inspection, and she's got her eyes open so she's definitely awake too.

Wait. Her _eyes are open._

Quickly springing up, the Doctor was back on his feet, and just as quickly he belly flopped onto the ground. He shuffled himself forward on his elbows until he was face to face with the girl. She was still just staring, wide eyed, mouth slightly agape. Like a freckly goldfish, he thought as he raised a finger.

How did 'Freckly Goldfish Girl' get into his TARDIS anyway? Oh, right, she'd knocked and he let her in. But that didn't explain how she'd found his TARDIS's location. Actually, even he wasn't sure of his location. It's all a bit technical really, and the manual certainly wasn't helping him. It would probably help more if he hadn't thrown it away though. Either way, he didn't have a clue where he was.

His eyebrows furrowed and his tongue stuck out the corner of his mouth unconsciously as he moved his finger closer to the girls face. Closer, closer, closer… Boop. He pressed his finger to the girl's nose.

And the girl pressed her fist to his chin.

* * *

Right… So, left tent to avoid paying for sister's nose job with money I don't have; wandered around forest for a bit; got _lost _in said forest; started to _rain_; found a big bloody blue _police box,_ of all things; fell into said police box and still… need to… pee…

Yeah, this all makes perfect sense, Cathy thought. Clear as fracking mud. She was still lying on the floor of the police box and was making no attempt to get up. Actually, since when was there this much room in a police box? It definitely didn't look this big from the outside….

Something briefly flashed through Cathy's mind. A blue police box, bigger on the inside, and it made the most peculiar noise. She'd seen that somewhere before. Probably some weird thing she'd glanced at on the internet. What was that website her friend had shown her again? Oh yeah, tumblr. That seems strange enough for it. Her friend had only shown her the site once or twice, and she still didn't know what the hell a 'Johnlock' or a 'Destiel' was. She wasn't sure she wanted to know.

She did, however, want to know what the hell was going on right now.

Her eyes were open. However, all she could see was a pair of boots with the trousers just skirting the top of them. Must be a tall bloke, she thought. That or he can't afford a decent pair of trousers. Suddenly, judging by the flash of ankles, the man appeared to crouch in front of Cathy. She continued to lay there, with her eyes wide open and attempting to control her breathing. Maybe if she just stayed very still she would disappear. Maybe _he _would disappear.

Wait, wasn't he the one that opened the door? Then it was his fault that she was face-planting and not peeing!

Very suddenly, with a flash of ankles, the figure hopped up and just as suddenly flopped down onto his elbows. Cathy's mouth dropped open slightly as she stared at the face moving closer towards her.

Jesus Christ, she mentally screeched, death by 'Chin Man'… Not really what she imagined on her gravestone. She'd sooner have expected to meet Slender Man in the woods. Also, someone needs a haircut. And seriously, a bowtie? Get dressed in the dark or don't own a mirror? Poor bugger probably thinks he looks like some sort of cool professor type. He's edging more into geography teacher territory with that tweed.

Crap, what's his hand doing? Why is he pointing at me? Did he just read my mind or something?

Oh God, it's coming closer.

Whilst Cathy was freaking out internally, she still kept her eyes focused on the 'Chin Man'. You know what they say, never take your eyes off your opponent and all that. Especially when they look like they're about to give you the poke of death.

It's alright, I can deal with this, I can _totally _deal with this… Times like these, Cathy found it much easier to tell herself unconvincing lies.

Wait, what was it that guy at work said? The one who does like five different martial arts and looks like he lives in a tanning salon… Damn, what was it? Maybe I should just bite him? No, he might be diseased or something…

_Boop._

Y'know what? Let's just pretend he said to aim for the chin.

And that's when Cathy's fist lashed out, nailing 'Chin Man' right in the, uh, chin.

* * *

**Yeah... _really _sorry about the lack of update so far... Been busy... Doing nothing...**

**Well, no matter, back now! For how long, I have no clue. This story is going to be one of those slow ones. Sorry about that. **

**I was thinking about possibly writing in a WhoLock or SuperWho chapter later. If anyone likes that idea then please tell me!**

**Anyway, thanks for reading!**

**- Callie**


	4. Chapter 4

What was that expression? Y'know, the one for when things have gone badly.

Oh yes: The shit has hit the fan.

That probably sums everything up right now, Cathy thought, standing up as she looked over at 'Chin Man'.

He was currently writhing about on the floor, shouting indignantly about how he was punched by a goldfish. Apparently, he was fond of stating the obvious whilst being incredibly vague (possibly insane) at the same time.

However, there was one thing which she was certain of about 'Chin Man', and it wasn't his obviously bad sense of dress. It was the glaring fact that he certainly wasn't a policeman. And his police box definitely wasn't a police box.

Maybe the entrance was just, in fact, an entrance to a secret underground bunker and Cathy had fallen farther than originally thought. And the man she'd punched was some sort of secret agent and he was either going to take her into custody for assaulting an officer (that would be awkward to explain to her family) or kill her where she stood and her body would never be found until 27 years later - and that's only because some other poor girl was lost and tripped over Cathy's boney decapitated arm.

Or maybe there was actually a far more logical and less bad horror movie style conclusion.

Cathy stopped her almost hyperventilating and ignored 'Chin Man' as he stood up, continuing his ranting whilst jabbing a finger in her direction. She turned back to the door she'd fallen through. It looked pretty normal, well, as normal as a police box door that leads to a bigger-than-a-police-box room could look. Maybe she should poke it with a stick. Maybe she should poke 'Chin Man' with a stick. _Maybe _she should poke _herself _with a stick to see if she's really awake.

Unfortunately, there wasn't a stick at hand. A slap in the face should work, right?

_SMACK!_

Nope. She was still standing in the box that wasn't a box. Let's try something harder.

_THUNK!_

No no no no… The door was _definitely _real… Which meant this was real. This wasn't just a dream. But if this wasn't a dream, then why was the room spinning?

And Cathy decided to do just what any clichéd female heroine would do with that bombshell; she fainted.

* * *

"I'll have you know that I am the Oncoming Storm! And another thing- Oi! What do you think you're doing to my TARDIS?"

First she breaks into his TARDIS, then she _punches _him, and then she _headbutts his TARDIS._ Oh no, this was not on.

The Doctor started to take a few steps towards 'Goldfish Girl', fully prepared to start a new rant about how no one touched his TARDIS except him. And River - but that was different!

Wait, what's she doing? Oh God, no, no no no… Is she about to-?

_THUD! _

She's fainted. Great. At least there wasn't any chance of her punching him again.

No, wait, that is not the priority here!

He took a few quick strides over to her crumpled body on the floor and bent down to take a closer look. Yup, she was definitely unconscious this time. She was breathing again too, so that was good. It sounded odd though, like she was blowing bubbles or breathing through custard.

"'Freckly Goldfish Girl' is blowing bubbles." He snorted slightly at the idea and continued his investigation.

He heard a sudden, sharp intake of breath come from her. It sounded slightly muffled again, and made a guttural noise in her throat. Ah, right, maybe he should move her from lying on her face.

Hooking his arms under her armpits (well, making his best attempt to), he hauled her deadweight of a body up off the ground. He dragged her (of course he'll say he carried her) across the TARDIS floor until they reached the railings which he propped her up against, sitting her down.

"Well, let's see what's the damage. Trust me, I'm The Doctor." She couldn't hear him, and he knew that. Honestly, he just enjoyed being able to say that.

He hadn't had a proper look before, but he knew that the red bubbling out of her nose was not part of what she looked like before.

She'd given herself a nose bleed.

By fainting in his TARDIS.

Of course, there had to be a first time for everything, he thought.

* * *

**I know... I knowwwwww... It's been ages. I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry.**

**I would come out with some fantastic excuse about studying for exams, or having a sudden onslaught of gastroenteritis, or even that my arms fell off, but I actually just forgot. Honestly, I've been living in an internet free zone for 3 months (not by my choice) and I just never bothered to write. **

**Not gonna make any promises about updates, just that it'll come when it comes.**

**Thank you for sticking with this and please review!**

**- Callie **


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